Exxon: A Dark Shade Of Green

ExxonMobil, the Texas-based oil giant, has pledged $100 million over 10 years to research "innovative and cost-effective" ways of meeting the world's energy needs. One of its partners in the project? General Electric.

So why is GE generating such positive buzz with its green initiative while Exxon generally looks like sludge? Look to the top. Lee Raymond, Exxon's chairman and CEO, is a verbal gusher of anti-global-warming rhetoric who opposes mandatory caps on greenhouse-gas emissions. Environmentalists accuse Exxon of being the "No. 1 climate criminal," responsible for the Bush Administration's refusal to sign on to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which sets...